THE GRUB REPORT: Kitchen Tool Box: Immersion blender

As a person who enjoys food a great deal and spends a lot of time cooking, when gift giving holidays roll around, I usually score more than my fair share of kitchen gadgetry. Of course, a lot of the stuff out there is good for one or two specific jobs and hardly worth the trouble of pulling them out from the dark recesses of the cabinets, but every now and again you find something you never knew you couldn't live without.

Quite a few such treasures have found their way to our house over the years by way of discerning family members. One of them is the immersion blender I received two Christmases ago.

Also known as a stick blender, an immersion blender is the Great Compromiser of the kitchen. Honestly, there is no single blending job that an immersion blender does better than any other piece of kitchen equipment, but what it can do is perform many of the tasks relegated to food processors, bar blenders and food mills pretty darn well.

Where this little baby really earns its keep is during clean-up. At the sink, your average bar blender or food processor becomes a brain teaser, defying you to disassemble, clean and then reassemble it in a timely manner. Cleaning an immersion blender, however, is as easy as running the blade in a little bit of soapy water.

If you have a blender and a food processor, I'd say that there's no real need to go out and get one of these. It will save you a lot of time cleaning up but will not offer any applications you cannot already perform. If you have neither a blender nor a food processor, though, you might consider buying an immersion blender instead.

Immersion blenders can come with a lot of bells and whistles. Mine, the Cuisinart Smart Stick, has three additional attachments that I've never used. But above all things, I think there are two key features you should always seek out when shopping for an immersion blender. A metal shaft is essential. It will allow you to blend directly in a pot, without worry that the intense heat will adversely affect your equipment. Also, avoid single piece models. Sure they are cheap, but the easy clean-up argument is moot if you can't remove the blending shaft for cleaning.

Since we've been writing the Grub Report, I've rediscovered the stick blender's many talents. In just about every blending application (Salsa Verde, Curry Paste, Hummus) I've opted for the stick blender over other options, and I've come to wonder why I waited so long to move it up to the varsity squad.

Do you have any kitchen equipment you can't live without?

Originally posted to The Grub Report by Steve Gibson on July 18, 2007 11:50 AM

Comments

At July 19, 2007 12:59 PM, Margaret Adams said...

I have two kitchen gadgets I can't live without. 1. My mini chopper. I use this little gadget to cut everything.2. My little brother that I can get all kinds of ideas and recipe's from. Really like your blog.